The Lynx Wrestling Team Wrestle Strong at the Art Kraft Memorial

The Lynx Wrestling Team wrestle strong at the Art Kraft MemorialDecember 10, 2016

By LC Student Wrestling Manager Kasey McCracken

Mat Kent vs. Tyler Hearns in the Gold medal finals at the Triton Open 2016

The Lincoln College (LC) wrestling team finished off the semester wrestling at the Art Kraft Memorial this Saturday at Triton College in River Grove, IL. The Lynx came home with 2 Champions, Ethan Reel (149 lbs.) and Mat Kent (285 lbs.), along with two 2nd placers, two 3rd placers, two 4th placers, one 5th placer and one 6th placer.

Reel, an LC freshmen who was competing in his first college tournament, wrestled hard all the way to the finals and won a gold medal. Reel was recovering from a knee injury/surgery and said on his comeback, “I came in this year with the mindset to get better each day. I came across a couple stumbles on the road, found out I tore my meniscus and had to have surgery; …just coming back on Thursday and easing back into things and each day progressing and trying to be that final product at the end of the year by putting in all the work to achieve my goals this year.”

Mat Kent, an LC sophomore, once again wrestled smart, hard and continued his streak on placing at every tournament so far this season. Kent captured his first gold medal of the year by winning in the finals against his teammate Tyler Hearns who is also an LC sophomore. Kent stated on his finals match against Hearns, “…at the same time, he kind of won that first place medal too because he (Hearns) is the reason why I am there. He is the reason why I am getting better every day and I cannot thank him enough for that – plus he wrestled his heart off.”

Head Coach Daryl Thomas commented, “I think it was a great way to finish the semester with Ethan Reel finally getting back in the action and and winning a championship which was promising to see. Mat Kent finally got himself a championship gold medal. He’s placed at every tournament and finally punched through and won a title. Tyler Hearns in the finals was also awesome and Kyle Eighner finishing third in the heavy weight division shows that our heavy weights really came to wrestle today along with a bunch of other guys.”

The Lynx Wrestling team’s next competition with be January 5th & 6th at National Duals in Fort Wayne, Indiana. The National Duals tournament is for National Junior Colleges. “We were invited into the National Duals based on how the team did last year. Originally, we were not expecting to be going and then a lot of teams dropped out or declined to go – so we were next in line and we ran with the opportunity. We are excited to be a part of it!” Head Coach Daryl Thomas stated.